Legal issues with 2nd-hand PC games
- Thread starter FoxEye
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How can you not see the difference between physical goods, and media?
Games, music, applications, movies, all media.
One could argue that selling games second hand is worse than normal piracy, as the seller is making money from the deal, whereas torrent uploaders do not.
The main reason why piracy is considered worse is that that software ends up with multiple people, selling a game 2nd hand only involves 1 new 'lost sale'.
Oh sorry, i forgot to add CDs, DVDs etc etc to the list. It isn't illegal or discouraged to sell any of those second hand either so why should games developers have a god given right to forbid it without going through the correct channels? If they appeal to make it illegal and win, fair enough by me, but at present all they're doing is using their own means to stop something that no other industry whether it be entertainment or manufacturing is stopping.
Out of curiosity, you list music and movies in your list of media, yet they belong in two of the largest second hand trades, so what's the difference exactly?
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Man of Honour
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I think that the modern day DRM idea is stupid anyway. I always bought the command and conquer series legally anyway, with RA3 I haven't bothered buying it and wont unless they remove DRM. However if I could find a way to stop the DRM from installing whilst leaving the game fully functional I would do so, that would probably be a breach of license. Technically illegal, but you could always argue that DRM is an abuse of consumer's rights anyway. To the OP, carry on. The games developers are getting their money and ** not getting the DRM rootkit on your system, win-win.
Soldato
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That would be a terrible argument, torrent uploaders have not bought anything off the game supplier in the first place, while someone buying the game has.
Nintendo and Sega tried similar things in the eighties and nineties, stopping people from buying games to rent them out, and having licencing for doing so.
Nintendo and Sega tried similar things in the eighties and nineties, stopping people from buying games to rent them out, and having licencing for doing so.
Physical goods can only be used by one owner at a time, media can be used by multiple people, including the original purchaser if they rip the music/movie/etc.
I couldn't care less in all honesty, doesn't really affect much in any real way, it's just funny to see someone buy a game, finish it, sell it for half it's price, and then get high and mighty about piracy, without realising that they have just prevented another sale of said game, and gotten a delayed discount on their original purchase.
![[TW]Fox](/data/man-of-honor/2009.png){kind=avatar}
it's just funny to see someone buy a car, use it for a year, sell it for half it's price, and then get high and mighty about car theft, without realising that they have just prevented another sale of said car, and gotten a delayed discount on their original purchase.
See? Now you know how retarded being against the sale of second hand items is.
I think that's an oversimplification. You are assuming that people could always afford to buy any new game they want, regardless of price.
For a lot of people, to help fund their purchase of new games they sell on their old games.
I sumbit that without that extra income, the number of new game purchases would fall. In order to maintain the same number of new games sold, publishers would have to lower prices.
I can say with certainty that not every 2nd hand game sale would be converted to a brand new game sale. It is likely some would, but it is also certain that such people would simply buy fewer games.
Thus I can argue that without second hand game sales, the number of new games sold would actually drop not increase, since not everyone has unlimited funds to buy new games.
[TW]Fox;12869534 said:
Agreed, that argument is flawed in that a lot of the time the sale wouldn't happen if the buyer had to buy it new. I've bought loads of xbox 360 games second hand that I'd never pay full price for, but the second hand price is enough to make me risk handing over the cash. To say you loose a new sale for every copy sold second hand is way off the mark.
Just had a completely random thought. I've sold on hundreds of games/cds/dvds/many other forms of media over the years, possibly more than a thousand. If i couldn't sell them on they would have ended up in the bin, think about the pollution man!?! All those plastic disks everywhere, the world would end!
If they're worried about the second hand trade eating into profits, thats something the devs need to take up with large retailers and publishers. The average person *loses* money selling their game on, unlike the retailers who mark-up preowned titles.
Also it's well within developers powers to keep users from selling on their titles by much less underhanded means. Take a look at games like half life where cd keys are needed to play online, this meant a user would keep their copy for years in order to preserve their ability to play the fantastic online and mods, or burnout paradise which keeps introducing new (free) patches that add extra vehicles or game modes.
Hmm, doesn't work that way with most of the titles I have. You're allowed to move it to a different PC and create another username if you like. Then again I don't own HL or Burnout or any EA games...
Oh yes, you are allowed to do so so selling on is possible, however what you've missed is the fact that a cd key can only be used online by one person at any one time. So, if someone were to sell half-life, cod4 etc etc to someone else then try to play online the cd keys would clash and they'd be booted off. It's perfect in my eyes, users can sell their products on but are encouraged to keep them.
But the CD key is tied to the particular copy, so how would that happen unless the seller kept the game installed without the media (which AFAIK isn't legal)?